Hasfariza Hassan

  Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli is an interesting story! It follows a woman writing a book and she has two children, a boy and a baby girl. At first, I was confused when all these characters did not have names. It made me wonder if the main character was Valeria Luiselli and it follows her train of thought and life as she writes the book. The quote, “It all began in another city and another life. (...) I was young, had strong, thin legs.” This points to how the story was set in the past and she was reminiscing her life. This element of time is evident in the story. There is an evident contrast with her current life in Mexico City, where she rarely leaves her house. This shows how that there is a stark difference between her life now and then and how that has affected their life. “We like to thin (...) there’s a ghost living with us and watching us” indicates how with her children and family, she often does not have the time and energy to focus on her writing. The story als...

  The Book of Chameleons was such an interesting read! It focuses on two characters, Felix Ventura and a gecko. This is very fascinating because the gecko is the book’s narrator and is unnamed for most of the book. I haven’t seen a book do this before, so it was a nice shift to read. In the book Atonement by Ian McEwan, there was a plot twist at the end of the book where the real narrator of the whole book is Briony. I was reminded of the book because how the narrator’s identity was a plot twist. Ventura described the gecko to be “the creature.” I thought that title showed how the gecko how power in paving the story and about what was going to happen next in the story. From the other books we’ve read so far in class, I liked how this book explored different themes that weren’t heavily focused on romance. The exposition of the plot is when a mysterious foreigner, a war photographer, wants Ventura’s help. I like how this story surrounds the theme of self-journey. As someone who alway...

  Money to Burn by Ricardo Piglia is such an interesting read!!! I loved the thriller element of the story which is a different genre of what has mostly been covered in class. Honestly, this was refreshing to read especially since thriller is my favourite genre to read. The story describes the events that unfold from September to November 1965 about an armed gang that robbed a van taking $7,000,000 in Argentine pesos of money (which is equivalent to around $30,000 to 50,000 US dollars). It also describes how it starts from a bank to the town in a municipality on the outskirts of Buenos Aires which ends up with them having to kill a courier and a police officer in the process.  I think it was really fascinating that in the epilogue, Piglia mentions that “This novel tells a true story” (204). I thought that it was really interesting that Piglia used a lot of sources that allowed him to “orchestrate the different versions of this same story from a variety of descriptions and evid...

  The Lover by Marguerite Duras was  such an interesting read! I think that a common element that we have read so far is about men who are horrible and dumb. And now we have a man who is interested in pedophilia. The Lover is about the relationship between a 15-year-old schoolgirl and her older romantic interest who approaches her in a limousine. Honestly, their age gap made me feel weird about their relationship at first. He would pick her up from school in the limousine and bring her back to his apartment. However, as I kept reading the story, it made me think about the power dynamic between the two. Usually, it would seem predator-like since he is preying on a 15-year old girl and he has the leverage in the relationship. However, their relationship is far from normal. This is because the girl believes that she has the leverage over the older man and thinks that he is “weak.” That made her believe that she wasn’t being exploited and this could be seen as her way of justifyin...

  The Hour of the Star by Clarice Lispector is a fascinating book!! The narrator, Rodrigo S.M. indicates that he will tell the story of a “northeastern girl” who is from one of Brazil’s poorest states, Alagoes. At first, I was confused about the plot of the storyline and what was actually happening in the story. From what I understand, the narrator is a writer and he created this character of the girl that he wants to write about. I wondered why Lispector had a narrator tell Macabea’s story instead of him just telling her story. Macabea is a nineteen year old girl and the story unveils the hardships of poverty. Macabae and her boyfriend, Olimpico have a cute story at first, but then it turns sour when he looks down on her for not having much aspirations. He has lots of aspirations, stating that “One day I’ll be rich” and “I’m very intelligent, I’ll end up a congressman.” His annoyance with Macabae stems from her not having many aspirations for herself. Some readers may see this as ...